By Adam HallidayAizawl, Oct 2 : The Mizoram government has plans to buy plots of private land and donate them to landslide victims within Aizawl city so they can build houses there.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the State Disaster Management Authority headed by Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla Tuesday.

Officials in the state have often complained that the compensation package given to victims of natural calamities, especially those whose houses are damaged, does not factor in the situation peculiar to hilly areas where entire plots are often lost with no chance of rebuilding houses there.

In May, a landslide in Aizawl's Laipuitlang neighbourhood killed 17 people and swept away 11 buildings (nine were homes), leaving behind a near-vertical cliff where it would be impossible to construct any buildings.

The victims were, under the central scheme, entitled only to compensation for damaged houses but not loss of landholdings and residential plots.